CHAP. CIII. SALICA‘CER. SALIX. 1469 
to imbibe the oozing water. They ought, therefore, either to be open drains, 
or drains built on the sides, and covered over with flags, to prevent their 
being choked up with the roots. A variety of cases may, however, occur, 
where it will be impossible to form covered drains; or where, perhaps, the 
expense might operate as a prohibition to doing so with the view of planting 
willows. In such cases, the ground may be formed into beds of a less or 
greater size, according to circumstances, by open cuts, or drains, of a sufficient 
width and depth to keep the soil dry. These open drains will require to be 
cleaned out every autumn and ‘spring; and the cleanings may be scattered 
over the general surface of the beds. In preparing ground for an osier plan- 
tation, if the soil be poor, it should be as well dressed with dung as if it were 
intended for a crop of wheat or barley. The manure most proper for willows 
is stable dung.” (Plant. Kal., p. 526.) Sang “tried lime as a manure for 
willows, but found the twigs much fired, or spotted, with a sort of canker ; and, 
in attempting to bend them, they readily broke over at the cankered place. 
Indeed, if a plantation of osiers be formed previously to a thorough preparation 
of the soil for the reception of the plants, the saving of the first expense will be 
found a most severe loss in the end, by the diminution of the crop in the suc- 
ceeding seasons. In no case should a plantation of willows be attempted, 
but in prepared ground; except, perhaps, where a few rows may be intro- 
duced upon the very brink of a river, or on the top of the banks of ditches, 
which form, in many instances, the barrier of the waters, where the soil can 
scarcely be dug or otherwise ameliorated. Nothing can be farther from being 
good management than planting the truncheons in grass land, and allowing 
the sward to remain green under, or among the crop. Having fixed upon 
the spot, and having also carefully prepared the ground, the next step is to 
procure plants. These should be of the last year’s wood, or of shoots of one 
year old, taken from the under end of well-ripened shoots of good size, 
and eut in a slanting direction, with a sharp knife; and they should be in 
lengths of 1 ft. or 1ft.4in. Every vigorous shoot will afford two or three 
plants. The upper end, as far as it appears soft, being unripe, should be dis- 
carded ; because such wood will only produce weak plants, and will not 
make such good roots the first season, as the firmer parts of the shoots will 
do. Pieces of two-years-old shoots of the same length, and cut in the same 
manner, may also be used ; but these are more expensive, and not better for 
the purpose, than the former. The distances at which osiers for baskets or 
wickerwork ought to be planted are 18 in. between the rows, and 12in. 
apart in the rows. This distance will not be too thick for at least five or six 
years ; but, after that period, every alternate plant should be stubbed up; 
which will leave those remaining at 2 ft apart in the rows.” (Jdid., p. 529.) 
“ Osier plantations,” Sang continues, “ must be carefully hoed and cleaned 
every year. Nothing contributes more to the raising of a good crop of twigs, 
after due preparation of the soil, than keeping it and the plants clean. The 
stools should be carefully attended to annually, from the first year of pro- 
ducing a crop of twigs, in order to keep them clear of rotten stumps, and not 
to allow them to be overcrowded at the bottoms ofthe shoots. When these 
have become too numerous, they should be carefully thinned out, and also cut 
down, leaving only an eye or two at the bottom of each, until they be dimi- 
nished to such a number as the stool is capable of supporting with vigour 
throughout the season. A basket-maker finds more service from one shoot of 
6 ft. or 8 ft. in length, than from four of 3 ft. in length; and one of the first 
dimensions will not exhaust the stool or the land so much as four of the 
others. The proper season for cleaning and thinning the stocks is from the 
Ist of March to the middle of April.” (Jbid., p. 530.) The rationale of 
choosing this season for the operation of cleaning the plants is, that, if it were 
performed in the autumn, the germs of the buds existing at the base of the 
small shoots cleaned off would swell in the course of the winter, and be 
liable to throw out shoots in the following spring; whereas, by delaying the 
cutting off of these till the sap is in motion, the germs remain dormant, the 
